CHAPTER XX
THE BLACK CAP
Four shadowy figures stood in front of him, holding flashlights. Behindthe blinding barrier he could make out Nora, crouched against a stainedand rugged wall. And the brute, George, was at her side, his muscularhands on her arm. Slim stepped out of the obscurity, moving for Garthwith a stealth and an evenness nearly cat-like.
Garth raised his revolver, strengthened by the knowledge that theinspector with many men would soon be tearing through the cellar doors.If only he could postpone the issue for himself--fight for time untilthat saving moment! There lay Nora's best chance, but her ignorance ofsuch a possibility couldn't account for the horror in her customarilyexpressionless face.
"It's no use," she screamed. "Get back, Jim! Quick! Through the door!"
Slim was so close that Garth could see the automatic held at his hip.
"You'll stick here, Garth," came the smooth tones. "And you might's welldrop your gun."
Garth saw George's hands tighten on Nora's arm. He understood then thereal threat by which they would control him.
"Hands off the girl!" he said.
But George smiled, and pressed tighter until Nora cried outinvoluntarily.
"That means, drop your gun. For any little damage you do here Nora'llfoot the bill."
She shook her head, but her face recorded an insufferable pain. Garthknew that the one shot for which he would have time would spare hernothing.
"I never expected to see the pride of your gang slinking behind awoman's skirts," he sneered. "I suppose those are four of the rats whohelped put your breakaway over. Six against one, and a woman for ashield!"
It chilled him that the four strangers exposed their faces to his glancewith a contemptuous indifference. He laughed, however, as Slim took hisrevolver.
"You giants must know that you haven't the chance of a pretzel at aDutch wedding."
Slim affected not to have heard, but his gestures lacked smoothness.
"Let's see how you enjoy your own jewelry, Garth."
And he reached in Garth's pocket and drew out the pair of handcuffs hehad been certain to find there. He snapped them on the detective'swrists. The four confederates lounged forward, produced stout cords, andbound them about Garth's ankles. His momentary resistance was smotheredby Nora's sharp cry:
"Don't fight, Jim!"
His sense of utter helplessness increased, while the men, in obedienceto Slim's gestures, stretched him on the floor. The surface was wet, asif the ooze of the river had penetrated this far. Slim stooped andglared at him, his eyes exposing a measureless resentment.
"Thanks for walking into our parlor, you fly cop. We heard how you andthe skirt had fallen for each other. We guessed if we gave you a leadwith some of her trinklets, you'd play the busy sleuth hound."
Nora's voice held the quality of a sob.
"Jim! Why did you come?"
He shrugged his shoulders. He forced on himself a semblance ofconfidence.
"Planted or not, the trail was my best chance."
Slim beckoned to George.
"Straight you've come to the place where I've dreamed for months ofgetting you."
Garth managed a grin.
"Cut out the bum acting, Slim. Let's hear what you've got on your mind."
He shrank from a reply. More and more he was impressed by theindifference with which these confederates constantly revealed theirfaces. He knew, if the inspector did not arrive quickly, he must sufferan eccentric and barbarous punishment. He tried to forecast the penalty,but his imagination was insufficient and his appraisal of Slim'scruelty too conservative. It wasn't until George stepped forward andNora screamed that he guessed why the others were unafraid of hisidentification, that he understood how his situation might involve morethan life and death. And, perhaps, the shambling creature outside hadput the inspector's party on the wrong track.
George placed a pint bottle in Slim's hand. A smoky liquid did not quitefill it. Slim turned to the others, assuming an attitude of mockery.
"This is the brave guy that side-tracked Simmons last summer and worethe gray mask just as if he had something, too, that would frightenwomen and children. He's the bull that steered us against the black capyesterday. Let's see how he likes hearing the sentence read himself.Only he isn't going to get anything as comfortable as the electricchair."
A laugh sneered through the cellar.
"Better speed it up, Slim," George advised.
Slim drew the cork from the bottle while his thin lips ceased to smile.
"Since you found a gray mask so becoming, Garth," he snarled, "it's onlyfair to give you honest cause to wear one. But you'll go poor Simmonsone better. _Your_ mask won't need any eye holes."
Nora cried out again.
"You couldn't do it," Garth muttered.
Beneath his rage lurked a fear of which he had never dreamed himselfcapable. To face death would have been so much simpler.
"What's in that bottle, Slim?"
"A black cap for you, damn you! Pure vitriol!"
He bent closer.
"Squirm! Those ropes and your own handcuffs will hold you. You'll beg mefor a bullet before I'm through."
George twisted the girl so she had to watch.
"Pipe your handsome beau, Nora! You'll think I'm more your style inabout ten seconds."
She shuddered.
"You're not bad enough to do that, Slim!"
"Watch me," he answered.
A complete satisfaction blotted from his eyes the fear he had hithertonever quite concealed--the quiet fear of a strong man who acknowledgeshis own inevitable destiny. Garth reminded him of that. It was his lastweapon.
"They'll get you, Slim. They're keeping the chair warm for you. Willthis help then?"
Slim laughed.
"Will it hurt? I've waited for this moment ever since you and she sentme to rot in the Tombs. I'll pay old scores while I can."
With an extreme deliberation he commenced to tip the bottle. The fluid,almost imperceptibly approaching the mouth, exercised for Garth adreadful fascination. It was easy to estimate its progress. George hadbeen right. In about ten seconds! And he couldn't get his chained handsto his eyes. He tried to tell himself it was impossible that thatinnocent-appearing fluid in the control of this criminal could condemnhim to an unrelieved blackness through which, hideously scarred, he mustgrope henceforth, a thing repellent and past use.
The lights were centred upon his face. It struck him as ironic thattheir glare should hurt his eyes.
Suddenly Nora sprang forward. She stretched her hand towards Slim, butshe didn't touch the bottle or his wrist, for the fluid filled the neck;was so close to the edge that a quick contact might have spilled it.George looked on, his hands in his pockets, his attitude expressingsatisfaction at a just and long-deferred punishment.
Slim smiled at Nora. He moved the bottle a little. A drop fell.Something tortured the skin of Garth's cheek. It was as if an iron atwhite heat had been applied against his flesh with a strong pressure.The stuff was real enough.
Again Slim moved the bottle sluggishly, so that the liquid, ready totrickle out, was directly above Garth's eyes. Nora reached and closedher hands about the mouth.
"Look out!" George warned. "You'll get burnt."
"You see, George won't stand for that," Slim said slily.
"No, no, Slim!" Nora whispered. "I'll bargain."
"You're in a swell position to bargain," George scoffed.
The handcuffs cut into Garth's wrists.
"You don't think," he muttered, "that I was fool enough to follow thattrail without covering myself?"
"That doesn't affect me," Slim grinned. "There's a getaway from thisplace no cop will ever find. Now, Nora! Hands off!"
But she resisted him.
"Slim," she said breathlessly. "You're not a fool. You must know that Ican bargain. Suppose you got clear--across the border--into Canada?Couldn't you keep out of trouble once you were there?"
Slim ceased
pulling at her hands. He stared at her, amazed, castingaside his last pretence.
"What you talking about, Nora? I know you're clever, but there aren'tany more miracles. There's no way out of this town for us."
Her voice was barely audible.
"Unless my father unlocked the gates."
Slim started. Garth, too, answered to a desire almost violent. SurelySlim would realize the hopelessness of securing the inspector'scomplicity, or, failing that, would seek, as Garth did, for thestratagem behind her plan. Slim, nevertheless, continued to study her,and the narrow face no longer hid his greed for life.
"There's no way under heaven to get the old man to stand for that."
She took her hands from the bottle. Her eyes did not waver.
"No one else could do it, but you know how he loves me. I could makehim do it as the price for myself and Jim."
Slim laughed shortly.
"One thing's certain," he mused. "If you did get away with it, I couldkeep you and the inspector straight. I'd take Garth, bound tight, someguns, and the acid along as gilt-edge securities. Hadn't thought ofthat, eh? Expected to trip me, didn't you? Well, Nora, you have letyourself in for a dicker, and, by gad I'm inclined to think it over,because I've got you this far: the minute you played queer Garth wouldgo blind and burnt."
Nora conquered her disappointment.
"You'd swear to let Jim go at the border?"
"On my oath I'd let him go clean."
"Not for a million," George broke in angrily. "She gets herself away,then she throws Garth down to see us roast in the chair. You ought toknow the skirt. She'd double cross the devil himself."
Garth waited for Slim's answer, his gaze controlled again by the acid.
"George," Slim said slowly, "any chance is worth playing now, for we'reas good as in the chair already. And I don't believe she'd throw Garthdown. You know what she went through with for the sake of a dead lover."
"You've got to show me," George sneered, "that she's forgotten the deadone to take on Garth."
"We heard in the Tombs," Slim said drily, "that these pigeons wanted toroost on the same stool."
With a growing wonder Garth watched Nora fling aside her reserve. Sheturned on George, raising her hands in an attitude of fury, as ifinspired by a passion beyond her control.
"And that's true. If you think I'd let him take that acid give thebottle to me, and I'll use it on myself instead."
She knelt at Garth's side, and for a moment the light in her eyes, herunrestraint, more than the result of her appeal, held him tense.
"Tell them, Jim," she cried. "If they made you that way I swear I'd killmyself."
She glanced up, tears in her eyes.
"I love him so much, Slim, that to save him I'd see my father dead."
A subdued murmur of voices sifted through from the street. They couldhear the stealthy straining of hands at the cellar doors. Nora arose,and, hiding her face, stood trembling.
"The bulls!" George whispered. "Throw the stuff and let's make ourgetaway."
Slim shook his head.
"I tell you it's a chance. All of you vamoose except George. We'll waitand see, and maybe we won't need you after this. Remember, Nora,there'll always be time for us to wash Garth's face and show our heels."
"Oh, I know it," she breathed. "I know it."
The lights snapped out. Garth was aware of clandestine stirrings. Thenthe silence of the cellar was broken only by the fumbling at the door.
"I'll let you go, Nora," Slim whispered. "Send the other cops back. Ifthey try to rush us, by God we'll do the trick on Garth and kill who wecan besides, the inspector first of all. So play straight."
Garth heard her retreating footsteps. After all he had accomplished hischief purpose. Through him Nora had found escape.
He heard a sharp splintering of wood, and a wan light, not much strongerthan the glow of the city through the mist, diffused itself in thecellar. The inspector's breathless voice reached them.
"Nora! Garth!"
Garth saw Nora's shadowy figure advance into the well of the door. Heheard her stifle her father's relief and tell him to order his menbeyond ear-shot. Her voice murmured. Garth guessed that it recited hisabhorrent danger and the terms on which she had agreed to buy hisrelease.
He strained his ears, understanding fully what depended on the answer,yet convinced that reasonably it could only be a refusal. In a way Norahad placed the responsibility for whatever might happen to him on theinspector's shoulders, but the alternative was too distinct. As theprice for his connivance the inspector must throw his position and hisreputation to the winds, perhaps, face a trial, more than likely to jailsentence. It was conceivable that his love for Nora would dictate eventhat sacrifice, but she would have to force on him an illusion of apassion as unaccounting as that which had convinced Slim. Could she actto that extent with her father? In spite of his logical interpretationof it, Garth responded to the memory of her agitation. Had she, infact, been acting in the cellar? Had his peril finally shown her heartthe truth? The two most compelling issues of his own life, as well asthe inspector's career, depended on the reply, and he could hearnothing. Nora and her father must have moved to one side, for theirvoices entered the cellar in barely audible murmurs. Slim had handed thebottle to George, and he moved now into the door well where he couldlisten.
Garth's nerves tightened. Always George held the acid close to thedetective's bound and helpless body. Of course the inspector couldn't doit.
Slim came slinking back. His whisper warmed the cold, damp air.
"I couldn't catch it all, but she's getting away with something."
The murmuring ceased, and through the wan light Nora glided,wraith-like, into the doorway, and called to them softly across thecellar:
"Slim! He hates me for making him, but he'll do what he can. He'll tellthe Harlem police and the towns along the Hudson that he's got you.He'll try to cover himself with a planted getaway. You have anautomobile. Take it and leave by the Broadway bridge. You'll catch theMontreal express at Tarrytown. You've plenty of time, and everythingwill be arranged; but he can't keep the wool over the districtattorney's eyes forever. If you're not over the border to-morrow morningit's no good. So catch that train."
"Come here, Nora," Slim sighed, "and let me thank you properly."
Her laugh was hard, more suggestive of forbidden tears than mirth.
"One hostage is enough. And, Jim, there's a condition for you. Fatherwon't budge unless you give him your word to go quietly. You have topromise on your sacred oath not to make any effort to escape or to throwSlim down."
"What's that for?" George asked suspiciously.
Her tone was contemptuous.
"Use your head, George. It would do father a lot of good to risk so muchfor Jim if he took matters into his own hands and got the acid just thesame."
"Right!" Slim agreed. "You've plenty of common-sense, Nora, and it'sgoing to give us a chance."
"You promise, Jim?"
He fancied an element of command in her voice.
"I'll do what you wish, Nora," he answered. "I promise."
"Then good-by," she called, and her voice no longer held any command,nor was it steady. "Good-by. If I only dared come over to you! God bringyou back safe to me."
Garth tried to fight back the response of his heart. He told himselfthat honorably he must accept all she had said that night as mimicrywhose only intention was to save his life. She would expect him to takeit at its real value, but he could not shake off the recollection of heremotion. With a great longing he watched her move into the shadowsbeyond the door.